Sky Blue Sky was, in my honest opinion REALLY underrated by critics far and wide. "Impossible Germany" for instance is a flat out masterpiece. I'm not saying that the album's a classic or anything, but still, it is really good.
SBS is IMO the best Wilco album. They've got this incredible sound, and they came back to a more simple songwriting. The album is in my top 100 of all time, and in my top 5 of the 2000s.
So it does every Nick, nicolas or Nicholas love Sky Blue Sky ?
i'd say it's their 3rd best album, behind summerteeth and a.m. and "impossible germany" is easily its highlight and one of the best songs tweedy's ever written. surprising to hear to some steely dan influence in there, and nels cline's guitar solo has to be one of the best of the decade
I think it's a terrific, underrated album whose reputation will grow with time. I don't think it's as good as SUMMERTEETH or YHF, but I'd pick it over A GHOST IS BORN (having recently picked up KICKING TELEVISION, I'd say that KT is to GHOST as STOP MAKING SENSE is to SPEAKING IN TONGUES - good songs made great by particularly inspired live performances).
I read so many reviews of SKY BLUE SKY when it came out that called it "sleepy," just because it doesn't have the avant-garde sonics that defined the previous two studio records. I'm sorry, but no album on which Nels Cline plays lead guitar can EVER be called sleepy. Enlisting the manically gifted Cline may be the best decision Tweedy's ever made.
I think its good not great, I just don't like What Light and I really don't like Hate It Here... but besides that its a solid album, really starts well.
I think critics were too hard on it when it first came out. It's a good album, but otherwise, the only times I look and say "Wow, that is awesome" are the parts nobody is singing.
It's my bad, but I don't fully GET Wilco. To me they are a nice rock band making nice modern rock albums. It's all very . . . nice. It's hard for me to put my finger on what I think is missing, but something strikes me as being a bit dull (and surprisingly so, since I can objectively hear that they are making very nice rock music).
I think it would help their art if Tweedy were a few degrees more insane. My favorite Wilco product is Mermaid Avenue, but I think it is the presence of the edgier Billy Bragg that puts that album over the top for me. I also like Uncle Tupelo's music better than Wilco or Son Volt, which I think can be attributed to the edginess created by the Tweedy/Farrar mixture.
For some reason I find myself comparing Tweedy's career to Neil Young's and Tweedy's keeps coming up short. That might not be a fair comparison, but do we have any other Neil Youngs from Tweedy's generation? (I'm not even going to look for a Dylan.)
For the record, I prefer Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and Being There to Sky Blue Sky.
Now that I read on wikipedia that Tweedy suffers from clinical depression and panic attacks, I feel bad about my choice of words above. I wish nothing but the best mental health for him in reality. What I was talking about is his musical persona. The whole thing just strikes me as being a bit to safe or calculated, but like I said that's just my subjective opinion.
Sky Blue Sky was very immediately grabbing, because it had a breezy but classy, melodic, warm sound, and the new guitarist brought a lot to it. BUT it hasn't aged very well, for me. I don't really find myself going back to SBS anymore. (a ghost is born had the opposite effect: didn't initially care for it but I love it more every time and still listen to it.) So while I initially thought that SBS was underrated, I now think it's a bit overrated. It doesn't belong in the top 150 of the decade, that's for sure.
Wilco is probably my favorite band of the past 20 years (Radiohead excluded.) That said, I was monumentally disappointed with Sky Blue Sky after such classics as Summerteeth, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and A Ghost is Born.
Wilco (The Album) is the band getting back on track for me, but it's still not as great as their previous albums.
